1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a work station table, and in particular a work station table wherein electronic sensors facilitate the assembly or packaging of inventory articles positioned on the table.
2. Description of Related Art
Mass production of products from individual product parts is often accomplished manually with the aid of work station tables. In general, the individual product parts, commonly referred to as inventory articles, are provided on the work station table, where an operator selects one or more of each type of article and integrates them together to form a final product. By providing a large quantity of each type of inventory article on the table, the process may be continuously repeated and a large quantity of final products may be quickly and efficiently obtained.
Automated assembly lines, such as that disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. Re 25,886 for example, are well known for product mass production. Such mass production systems generally include a transport mechanism for transporting a component to a plurality of stations at each of which a particular assembly function is carried out by a machine. Such systems have the disadvantage that they may not generally be configured to mass produce different products, but rather may only mass produce the one product for which it was designed. Moreover, a defect in any one station may shut down the entire production line. Furthermore, such systems are generally expensive to implement, and their complex design makes them difficult and expensive to repair.
Conversely, work station tables for manual product assembly are relatively inexpensive and may mass produce any number of diverse products, depending on what inventory articles are provided on the table for integration. However, mass production of products with conventional work station tables is accomplished by human operators, and as such, mistakes in the selection of inventory articles are a significant problem. For example, an inventory article may be inadvertently left out of the final product, or an inventory article may inadvertently be selected twice. Another problem with conventional work station tables is that, in an effort to reduce the rate of defective product production, the number of different inventory articles placed before any given operator for integration is kept low, generally about 2 to 3 articles. This places a significant limitation on the rate at which products may be mass produced.